Uncover new information about your family members who entered the United States in the state of New York, along the country’s northern border with Canada and the Great Lakes. Find out crucial details about your ancestors like their age and birth place.

What can these records tell me?

There are more than 160,000 records in this collection documenting people crossing the U.S.-Canadian border in upstate New York, and each includes a transcript and an image of the original document. While the information for each person may vary, New York, Buffalo, Niagara Falls, and Rochester arrivals, 1902-1954 usually provides:

First and last name

Age

Birth year

Birth place/nationality

Arrival year

Discover more about New York, Buffalo, Niagara Falls, and Rochester arrivals, 1902-1954

The cities of Buffalo and Niagara Falls, along Lake Erie, and Rochester, along Lake Ontario, are importantly positioned, not just for moving between the United States and Canada but for those moving between the Atlantic coastline and the interior of the continent. As a result, many of the individuals represented in these records entered the United States through these lake port cities, either by sea or land crossings. In addition to these cities, this collection also includes other arrivals in other New York cities along Lake Ontario and the Saint Lawrence River like Lewiston, Hogansburg, Malone, Morristown, Nyando, Ogdensburg, Rooseveltown, and Waddington.

Explore these records and discover the various routes your ancestors took to enter the United States. The details you learn will help you to continue your genealogical research in our other collections of New York records and newspapers and US national collections, like the census and military records. These records are in the process of ongoing indexation, so if you cannot find your ancestor in the index now, check back again soon.